reynolds-the-quran-in-its-historical-context-2

444 Joseph Witztum?ialect and might have been transmitted via an intermediate language. 91 It is more1mporta?tto .re~ognize that the Syriac sources and the Qur' an relate the Josephstory usmg s1mll~r vocabulary. This in itself is not conclusive, but could supportother stronger ev1dence such as the motifs discussed above.Al~o worthy. of mention are two ~abic phrases which might reflect phrasesus~d m t~e Synac sources. In the Qur ii.n the brothers refer to themselves twice asa U:f~a,.l.e. a band ?r group of men (Q 12:8, 14). There is no such description inthe B1bllcal text; ne1ther have I found an exact equivalent in rabbinic sources.92 Inthe Syriac tradition, on the other hand, it is quite comnion for texts to refer to thebroth~rs as a giidda, that is, a band, company, or troop. 93 Interestingly, one of the~ab1~.w?rds u: ed.by ~e t~nth-cen~ lexicographer Bar Bahliil to gloss Syriac4gudda I~ U:fba. L1kew1se, m the Qur ii.n and PsN, Joseph is thrown to the bottomof the p~t, ghayabat 5 ~l-fubb in Arabic (Q 12:15) and esteh d-gzlbbti in Syriac.96In the B1ble only the p1t IS mentioned.These last examples might seem trivial, but I believe that it can be shown inboth ca~es that th~ S~ac usage reflects an interpretive conflation of the Josephstory w1th other B1bllcal texts (Genesis 49:23 in the case of gzldda, 97 and Daniel91 Note, for ex~mple, the ~xis~ence of ba 'ar ("ox, bull, homed cattle") and gabb in classical Ethiopicas well as b rand a denval!ve of the root k-y-1 meaning "measurement" in Old South Arabian· seeLeslau, Comparative Dictionary of Ge 'ez, 84, 176; J.C. Biella, Dictionary of Old South Ar~bic·Sabaean Dialect, Chico: Scholars Press, 1982,51 and 245. .92 The cl?sest parallels I found are Genesis Rabba 98.18 (ba 'ale me/1i 0 at6) and Targum Onqelos onGenests 49:23 (ba 'ale palgziteh), the meaning of which is far from clear. In any case, both sources~o not r~fer to the brothers as a band separate from Joseph. Moreover, this description did not maketis way mto the retelling of the story itself.93 See PsN, 524; 585. Balai uses both gziddd (see, e.g.,l2, 54, 168, 305) and its synonym si'ta (see,e.g., 6.' ~0, 186, 285) throughout. Another term used is kensa; PsN, 578, 583, 602. See alsoGrosdtdter de Matons, Romanos, 208 and 230, where charas is used.94 R. Duval, Lexicon Syriacum ~uctore Hassano Bar Bahlule, Paris: E Reipublicre typographreo,1888-1901, 1:460. ;he_r?~t -$-b appears also in the Syriac of PsN, 529, describing the lovebe~een brothers (/lubba ~1ba d-baynat abe}, but n 0 iba might be a better reading there.95 Thts word appears only m Q 12:10 and 15. Derived from the root gh-y-b (being distant orconc~l':d), its meaning is fairly clear from the context. Nonetheless, several variants are found:ghayabat (pl.), ghayyabat (pl. of intensified form), ghayabat or ghaybat (the nomen verbi)· seeal-Kha!ib, Mu 'jam al-qira 'at, 4: 186-88.'96 PsN, 526.97 The Hebre:n text of this verse referring to Joseph is not entirely clear, though it is often translateda~ong the hnes of: "The archers (ba 'ale /1i 00 im) fiercely attacked him; they shot at him and pressedhtm hard." Instead of "archers" (literally: "masters of arrows"), the Peshitta reads "masters oftroops (maray gzidde)," which is glossed by Ephrem as "the heads of the tribes·" TonneauEph~aem_, 116, English .translation in Mathews and Amar, Ephrem, 207. The origin offuis Peshitt~readmg ts debated. Wettzman suggests that gzidde (r